The immaterial, malleable demon of dust and mist. It wouldn’t be much different from the body of wet dough I’d been using. Imps and Gremlins, with their hands and legs, would have been much better for my mind. I was sure of that.

But no. I didn’t want all my experience to count for nothing.

…well. I just wanted to say something cool there. My life was going to be shitty no matter the choice anyway, so I didn’t put all that much thought to it.

I could feel myself being arranged into something different, and apparently my brain didn’t like that very much. My vision whited out, I felt myself thrown into a raging whirlpool, twisting and turning in incomprehensible directions. Nausea and dizziness began to lay siege, without mercy. Head-splitting pain. An infinite number of ants swarming-

-no, no. This wasn’t real! I didn’t have a physical body at the moment. This was nothing more than a delusion cooked up by my mind! I knew that, but fucking idiot brain!

Come on, stay a… wake…

…
……
………

Oh boy.

It took a whole day for my evolution to finish.

I seriously thought my non-existent head was going to explode.

Well, to be more precise, the Evolution itself probably only took a few minutes, but after it was done I couldn’t move for all of a day.

I only just managed to start thinking human thoughts again an hour ago. Until then, my world was made of headaches, flashing colors in my eyes, and so much nausea that I couldn’t move a millimeter.

I still couldn’t, even now. My new body’s senses were all out of whack.

Ghast. A low demon of dust and gases. See this “dust and gases” part? That was the problem. My senses extended to every single particles that made up my body.

What this meant was that every time the wind blew, armies of ants would start having a party on the parts of my body moved by the breeze.

Such a pain…

I’d been trying my best to ignore the whole thing, but on second thought, that might not have been the best idea. If I tried to get used to this body by ignoring the problem, that would mean discarding the advantage of using a monster avatar in the first place. Instead, I should turn the problem into a solution: make my hypersensitivity work for me rather than against me.

That was the strength of monsters, and also what separated them from humans.

…at the same time, I had the strangest feeling, as if I was slowly losing bits and pieces of my own human vulnerabilities from all the abuse my mind had suffered since I started using this monster avatar…

Was weakness not what make humans so beautiful, in the end?

Alright, that was enough monologuing. I got so much more powerful now; I should try to get moving as soon as possible.

That reminded me, my status showed [Low Demon (Low-Rank)]. That’s two ‘low’ in a row. How weak was the pre-evolution ball of dough, then?

I was lucky that no caterpillars or snakes came by when I was still immobile. There was a squirrel, but it ran the moment it found out I was here.

My first priority would be to learn how to use my senses. For the first time, I opened my eyes and truly looked at what was happening with my body. Immediately, a torrent of information slammed into me.

…head hurt. Too much useless information. I didn’t need to know how many blades of grass or grains of sand I was touching, or how much dust was blowing in the wind. Huh, I just realized how reliant on sight and hearing humans were, despite having five senses.

Anyway. I should try to selectively process only the relevant information. Hopefully my subconscious could handle the task for me if I practice enough. If not, well, I’d probably go insane, so I couldn’t slack off here.

Which meant I’d need to train my brain to get used to this amount of information as its new default state. Oh boy… I wasn’t looking forward to returning to reality after this. It’s going to be a hell of a time getting used to the lack of information again.

Let’s do this bit by bit, then. This sort of training was never meant to be completed in a day or two. Meanwhile, I should try to move.

I supposed this body should handle the same way as the doughy one. It was the reason why I picked the Ghast, after all. I was going to facepalm so hard otherwise.

…oh? Oooh! I just floated!

I see, I see, so Ghasts could float. Well, not surprising, actually. They were made of gases. On one hand, this afforded me so many new possibilities. On the other, stomach-churning nausea, again… Blergh.

My vision hadn’t stopped turning since a while now, most likely due to my body constantly being moved by the air currents, and it’d continue to do so as long as I wasn’t being aware. So I focused my consciousness and forced my body to stay still. Finally, I could see myself.

I looked like… a 1-meter sphere of incredibly thick smoke? Not exactly outside my expectations, but why was I white again? The game reproduced my albinism in the weirdest ways. Please stop it already.

Ah, right. You know what happens when you pour water on dry ice? That.

I drifted forward. Hey, this worked. Felt like I was bungee jumping every time I moved, which was scary, but I could move the same way I did when I was still a slime.

I couldn’t rise too much, though – there was some kind of force pulling me down, and its strength was proportional to my distance from the ground. It was difficult to get any higher than the height of the windows of a two-story building.

So that was my vertical limits. Horizontally, I could move as fast as a person walking, or race-walking if I pushed myself. Faster than dough-me, obviously. You’d think I would go ‘Weeeee! I can fly!’, but no, my perception was much too sensitive for that. Bugs were crawling on my skin every time the winds touched me. Nothing was fun about this.

…really, could I ever get used to this?

For the time being, I elected to process enough information for my senses to be slightly better than a normal person’s. Particularly my sense of smell and presence detection – for those, I tried to be as aware of the unconscious goings-on as possible.

Oh, found a red caterpillar. It looked small, so probably a male. I silently drove my body of gas closer and prepared to attack… I could just attack the same way I’d been doing, right?

I thrusted a part of me forward. There was no impact. The tentacle of air simply covered the caterpillar and sucked it dry in a few seconds.

…holy crap.

I couldn’t believe this was the same caterpillar I used to have so much trouble with. I just won in a flash. Gruesomely, too.

Apparently I also drained its lifeforce with that attack. Well, that was good and all, but it didn’t give me much. Could be because of my evolution. Setting the dark-reds aside for a moment, but the red ones used to give me around 7 points.

That’s it, then. I might be outgrowing this area. It’d been my plan to leave the forest once I got stronger, anyway.

…still, if I saw any, I’d hunt. Points were important, even if just one.

Another 10 more reds hunted after a day of journey. I’d gotten a lot more used to moving myself. Filtering information was still difficult.

This forest was huge. I’d never seen anything other than trees the whole time. I’m not actually going deeper, am I? That wasn’t to say coming across a human village wouldn’t be a problem, however.

Oh, I detected something. A stronger presence than most.

What was it? Where was it? I stayed on guard for a while, but saw nothing, so I decided to hover forward. There it was, behind a large tree.

Maybe I just imagined it, but I thought our eyes met. As much as I could have eyes.

It was a black caterpillar, around 60 centimeters, and twice as large as a red one.

Whoa! It just screeched and spat out fire without warning. From all the way over there, too!

Quite a bit more powerful than reddies. Was this the next evolution step of the dark-red? Why caterpillars? Get to butterflies already.

Wait, what are you doing spitting fire in a forest?! Damn it, I couldn’t afford to stay defensive fighting a high-power monster. All-out offense!

I circled around the big tree to strike from its back. It spat flame at me once, but I still continued. A part of me stretched out and enveloped the bug.

By the way, I did a [Reroll] to dodge the flame, but it failed. Like always.

Just as I thought, that wasn’t enough volume to do any meaningful damage. I went for broke and rushed at the black caterpillar, using my whole body to cover it. It resisted violently, trying to bite me.

I worked to absorb as much of its life as possible before the bug could hurl flame again. In the end, it was just a caterpillar. It never attempted anything other than biting. Finally, it wailed, breathing its last.

That was a lot of points. I got 10 points from the reds on my way here, so one black caterpillar was 7 points.

I could make use of these bugs. The best thing was that they didn’t have any way to hurt me besides the flame. So, blacks were relatively safe to kill and gave me a good amount of points, which meant I could settle down here for a while…

…that was before I found out that there were way too few blacks, compared to the number of reds. In hindsight, it should have been obvious. Monsters had more magic and lifeforce than normal animals. To grow stronger efficiently, monsters would have to fight one another. So the higher on the pyramid, the less of them existed.

…oh well, I’d just have to be patient and search. I also got used to handling myself a bit better now, so it was time to try to see how far away I could detect presences.

I rose almost to my height limit, despite the warning signals telling me to get back down now now now, spreading myself as wide as I could to let my detection sense do its work.

Normally, my range was around a basketball court. This time, I expanded my perception, only checking for magic and the general sizes of the presences themselves. The details were ignored. The more useless information I took in, the worse the stress on my brain, setting me on edge and lowering my accuracy.

I forced my body and mind back together the moment they were about to scatter and evaporate. Too close! What were the developers thinking? They didn’t even implement any sort of limits or safety checks for avatars! I’m pretty sure I was just about to become a vegetable right there if I didn’t stop in time!

…that scared the crap out of me. Let’s be more careful from now on.

At the same time, if I hadn’t forced myself so, I wouldn’t have found that strange presence. They were a long way away from me. The presence only had about half my magic, yet felt strangely powerful. And bizarre. They were killing what I suspected to be black caterpillars, one after another.

Might the presence be a human? If they were killing monsters, then perhaps… a beta tester?

Whenever I visit Europe the cities are beautiful, the atmosphere and people are stylish, and I have fun every day, but it’s still Japan that I feel most at home in~

Green tea over black tea. Rice over bread.

The first thing I did when I got home was eat some ume salmon chazuke! Hahhh~ This was the taste of Japan~

In Zui’ran the high school class trips were timed to the Golden Week holidays so that they wouldn’t affect our studies so much. My family had gone overseas as well, but they timed their homecoming to match mine.

We had a fun talk about our trips while the living room was packed full of souvenirs. Naturally Oniisama was included!

“Did you have fun on your class trip?”

“Yes! Very much! And you all?”

“We had a good time, but I’m a little tired,” Otousama admitted.

“That’s because you golfed all day, dear.”

Okaasama’s skin was smooth and silky because of her stay at a beauty salon, but Otousama looked a bit exhausted.

As for Oniisama, he had gone to Hokkaido with some uni friends of his.

He even brought back a lot of my favourite desserts for me!

Corn Chocolate was impossible to stop eating once you began~

I hadn’t felt any homesickness while I was gone, but seeing my family’s for the first time in ten days made me awfully happy for some reason. I was all over them, and just chatted all night.

Ehehe. I wonder if maybe I had actually missed them.

I was even finding Otousama’s belly endearing. Homesickness was such a fearsome thing.

Look, Oniisama! I got you all these souvenirs! Aah~ So happy.

*

──But still, it wouldn’t do to forget that I had lost something precious during my trip. My urna was gone now.

During my last night in Rome I had noticed its absence and fallen into a panic.

The next morning I had forgotten again, but now that my good luck charm was gone dark days were surely awaiting.

The first order of business was sitting in the corner of my room.

The hoya kerrii that I had received as a present last Christmas had withered up. What had once been a lively green heart-shape was now a rotten brown thing.

I had given it extra water so that it could endure while I was on holiday, but it seemed to have been the wrong choice.

The fact that the temperature had dropped while I was gone probably hadn’t helped either.

I’m sorry, Hoya-chan! Forgive me!

Hoya-chan who I spoke to every day, in the hopes that she would grow up faster.

Hoya-chan who lent an ear to my daily complaints about being stuck as the Chief of the Forever Alone Village.

It didn’t look like nutrition supplements would help her at this point. After all, I could smell a bit of rot…

How could I explain this to Kitazawa-kun? It hadn’t even been half a year yet, and I’d killed his present. I didn’t have the guts to tell him.

Aah, I felt so guilty…

People called the hoya kerrii the love heart plant, and it was supposed to help your luck in romance.

I myself had prayed to her that I would finally experience my own romance this year.

It had come to nothing though.

The fact that it had rotted spelled nothing but misfortune for my coming love life.

I was feeling nervous now.

Hoya-chan, please don’t curse me, okay?

Just head straight to heaven.

*

*

It happened during the morning of my first day going back to school.

I awoke in bed to cacophonous warbling.

Already having a bad feeling about it, I pulled back the balcony curtains to investigate.

There were two pigeons there!

So early in the morning and I was already meeting my natural enemy!

Go away!

I was too afraid to open the window though, so the best I could do was smack on the glass to try to scare them.

Fortunately it worked, and my presence sent them flying away. Thank goodness…

What could have been a refreshing morning had already been ruined. They better not have pooped on my balcony.

I opened my window to check. Thankfully they hadn’t, but… taking a closer look, there was a strange bundle of twigs under the air-con outdoor unit that sat to the side of my balcony.

What on earth was that? …Wait.

“Uwaaaaah!”

Inside there were a number of round white things!

Don’t tell me they were eggs!?

Those pigeons had left their eggs here! Plural! There were two!

Oh my god. Those two birds had been a couple.

While I was away they had taken the chance to build a nest and lay their eggs here.

What was I supposed to do? I was too scared to get rid of them myself.

Oh no, what if they hatched right now!?

The only course of action I could think of was to get changed and call for help.

Somebody please take care of this problem in place of my cowardly self…

The housemaid who replied to my call looked at the nest in surprise.

“While you were away I did some light cleaning and aired out your room, Reika-ojousama, but I overlooked the area under the air-conditioning unit. My apologies.”

“No, it was because they picked somewhere so out of sight. You could not have helped it.”

To begin with, it was my request that they only did the bare minimum of cleaning while I was away. It was because I was hiding candy in my room, and secret savings, amongst other things.

Instead, I relied a lot on a cleaning robot. The appliances of modern civilisation were wonderful indeed.

Sometimes I do find a few dust bunnies living under my bed though.

“I hadn’t noticed anything while cleaning the windows the other day though,” the maid mused.

“Then it must have been a recent development,” I concluded.

I hadn’t heard any chirping or flying before the class trip after all.

This must have happened because I lost my urna…!

“Ah! The pigeons have come again!” I shouted. “On the handrail!”

“Hey! Go away!” my housemaid shooed them, but with their nest here I knew it was only a matter of time until they were back.

They could hardly leave their eggs behind.

“What’s the matter?” Oniisama asked from in front of my door.

“Oniisama!”

The noise must have brought him here.

“Oniisama, it is terrible! Some pigeons have built a nest on my balcony! And of all things they even laid eggs!” I cried.

“Built a nest? Oh, so they have.”

“Shall I put them in a nearby park?” my housemaid suggested.

Thank you! Could you?

Unfortunately Oniisama stopped her.

“The Wildlife Protection and Proper Hunting Act prohibits us from disposing of the eggs of wild birds.”

“Ehhhhhhhhhhh!?”

Then what were we supposed to do!?

If the egg hatched then the whole family would be settling here for real!

Didn’t they say that birds knew how to return home!? I couldn’t let that be my balcony!

What if they lived out their entire lives here!? Please no!

“I can’t be room mates with the pigeons, Oniisama!” I cried tearily.

“…Please call the Office of Animal Control.”

Ohh! As expected of Oniisama! So reliable!

The housemaid said that she would call them first thing, so that was that.

Haah. Could I count this problem as dealt with, for now?

“Thank you, Oniisama. I apologise for the ruckus so early in the morning.”

“No, no, it just really feels like you’re back now.”

I wasn’t sure what his smile meant, but Oniisama patted me on the head.

Maybe Oniisama was worried about my frayed nerves because he drove me to school that morning.

Yaaaay~

Oniisama looked so cool driving the car in his suit!

“I must say, that was surprising. When I woke up I hardly expected to find a pigeon nest in my room.”

“I guess you would be.”

It was bad enough that they attacked me with poop from the sky, but to think they even followed me home to finish me off, those damned pigeons!

And a couple, no less.

Even though they were just pigeons they sure had a lot of nerve acting all lovey-dovey like that.

I guess it couldn’t be helped though. It was spring after all.

“I suppose this comes with spring,” I sighed. “I wonder if things will calm down after this.”

“Unfortunately, pigeons are in heat all year around, so they lay quite a few eggs.”

“Ehhhhh!?”

What the heck!? This was the first I’d heard of this!

“Reika, I’m driving so don’t grab my arm like that, okay?”

“Sorry.”

In heat all year round!? Didn’t these pigeons have any morals!?

These pigeons were unforgivable…

As expected of my natural enemy. As it turned out, pigeons were the chiefs of the Fulfilling Bird Romance village!
“Then that means that even if we get rid of the nest and eggs they might simply do this all over again!?”

This wasn’t a joke.

How could they get sexy on somebody else’s balcony!?

Unforgivable!

“I’ve asked them to take measures to keep pigeons away, so there’s nothing to worry about.”

“Oniisamaaa!”

“Reika, I’m driving so don’t grab my arm like that, okay?”

“Sorry.”

By ‘measures’, I wonder if he was talking about nets and CDs.

Or could it be traps instead?

“Oh, I just remembered, Oniisama. I bought some souvenirs for Imari-sama as well, so I was hoping for a chance to hand them over. Do you know if he plans to visit our house any time soon?”

“Just have it sent by courier.”

Ehhh~?

Imari-sama gave me so many presents normally, so I wanted to hand them over personally to show my gratitude.

Wasn’t having a courier send it a bit dispassionate? Although that was exactly what I did for Valentines, since it was food and all.

Oniisama glanced over at my dissatisfied expression as said, “I’ll let him know.”

I’m counting on you, Oniisama!

*

*

When I arrived at school I spotted new members of the Fulfilling Romance village, thanks to the effects of the class trip. Damn them all…

What phenomenon caused all these new couples after a school trip? It had been a mystery in my previous life too.

It made no sense.

“Gokigen’yoh, Reika-sama. We were just talking about the class trip.”

“Gokigen’yoh, everyone.”

When I arrived in the classroom a number of my friends had already been chatting together.

I want to talk about the trip as well.

Lemme join in~

“It certainly was quite a trip. Which city were you just talking about?”

“Well… Actually, in Rome some students apparently spotted Kaburagi-sama and Takamichi-san at a café together…”

“Eh!?”

Oh my god.

Just how many times had I told him to be careful about being seen!

“Are we sure it was the two of them?” I tried. “Perhaps they were mistaken.”

“But would anyone really mistake somebody else for Kaburagi-sama?”

…It was true that the idiot was stupidly noticeable.

It didn’t take long for the rumours to spread like wildfire.

According to the rumours it happened at a café famous for its tiramisu. The two of them were seen happily chatting to each other before boarding a taxi and riding off.

Since nobody had the guts to question Kaburagi, naturally they hounded Wakaba-chan instead.

Flustered, she replied “We just happened to meet…” but then they asked why the two of them boarded a taxi together in that case.

The fact that they had been sampling desserts together the whole day was still a secret. Still, it was now a confirmed fact that she had at least spent some amount of time with him in Rome.

Aaah, I just got back and I could already see the trouble brewing!

When I returned home, I found blooming flowers on my balcony.

The handrail had been wrapped in rose vines. It was lovely.

Truly the balcony of a maiden.

Ooh, and there were urara roses too.

That said, I was confused about the change.

As it turned out, pigeons apparently hated the smell of roses, so we had the gardener set this up after the nest was cleared away.

It wouldn’t have done to have anti-pigeon nets, I suppose, to say nothing of CDs hanging on the balcony.

It was the Kisshouin estate, so there were appearances to uphold after all.

But I was concerned.

If gardeners had green thumbs, then mine were definitely brown.

I even managed to kill a cactus, so how long would these flowers last on my balcony…?

“Tirol Choco, individually wrapped chocolates with endless flavor variations, are created and distributed by Tirol Choco Co.Ltd. With the catchy, colorful wrappers, reasonable price and over 300 flavors to choose from, Tirol choco was an instant success. Over the years it became a solid staple for chocolate lovers of all ages in Japan.”

They’re like ten Yen each or something.

Also ‘maki（巻き）’ means ‘curl’.

I’m pretty comfortable around strangers, and I’m not picky about who I interact with either.

That said, when I entered the high school section and my homeroom teacher told me that the Kisshouin Reika was going to be class rep with me, I’ll be honest:

‘Uwaah, are you kidding me!?’ was my first thought.

Kisshouin Reika──

A member of the privileged Pivoine group, and the Big Boss of all the girls.

Rumour had it that if you crossed her, her subordinates would have you disappear into the abyss…

Well, jokes aside, the point was that a ‘class representative’ was just a glorified odd jobs position.

Nobody would believe that a member of the Pivoine would willingly clean up after their class. Not only that, but I wasn’t looking forward to bending backwards to avoid hurting her pride and feelings.

While I was feeling rather gloomy, Akizawa suddenly called out to me.

“Satomi, apparently you’re going to be class rep with Kisshouin-san?”

“Uh, yeah. Hey, speaking of which, aren’t you supposed to be pretty close with her?”

And he kept calling her a childhood friend, but she was probably his girlfriend.

“Kisshouin-san and I went to cram school together in primary. We became friends, but after that she got to know Sakurako too, and now the two are best friends.”

“Ohhh~?”

He just called Kisshouin Reika his friend without batting an eyelid.

This guy was kind of amazing.

“Oh right. Giving her some sweets when she’s tired will cheer her right up.”

“What are you talking about?”

“Since we were kids her mood has always soured a little when she’s hungry. If you give her something sweet though, her mood shoots right back up. Even Sakurako says that as long as you give her food, that girl… Ah, nevermind that,” he corrected himself quickly. “Anyhow, try talking to her without being biased. She’s easy to misunderstand, but she’s actually pretty earnest, and a good girl.”

With that said, he left the classroom.

An earnest and good girl, huh?

I considered withholding my judgement for the moment.

…But as if a member of the Pivoine, and Kisshouin Reika no less, would be the type to cheer up just by eating some dessert.

*

Anyway, after that I began my tenure as class representative with Kisshouin-san.

I have to admit that my expectations were overturned.

Sitting there as her followers carried out her will with nothing more than a glance.

That was the image I had of ‘Kisshouin Reika’ but when we began working she proactively gathered the forms from everybody, and would head off to hand them in at the Student Council like it was a matter of course.

She even replaced the classroom supplies before I noticed that they were lacking.

Being honest she was actually doing a better job of it than I was.

Akizawa was right; I really shouldn’t have judged by appearances.

Another happy surprise was that having her around made form collections abnormally efficient.

Even the newly enrolled Externals knew that going against her was a bad idea, to say nothing of the Internals.

Compared to other classes, everything went crazy smooth for us.

Thank you, Kisshouin-san.

Of course I couldn’t just leave everything to her. But when I told her that I’d take the forms to the StuCo room, she just snatched them out of my hands.

Uh, hey, you don’t have to panic like that. I’m not trying to steal your job or anything.

Ah. She just tripped over empty floor.

But she was still clutching onto the forms.

I watched her go.

Did this count as being earnest…?

I had the feeling that she had some sort of ulterior motive though…

*

Going back to those Externals, it was clear from the onset that there was a huge wall between the Internals and them. It’s the same with any elevator school though.

Still, with Zui’ran’s unique traditions, maybe it was harder to assimilate here.

As the class representatives it was our job to reach out to them, so Kisshouin-san suggested having a class lunch together.

I liked the idea, but was it even possible to guarantee that many seats together in the cafeteria? I was also worried that the upperclassmen wouldn’t look kindly on some newcomers monopolising their own corner of the cafeteria.

When I voiced my concerns, Kisshouin-san just proudly flashed the red peony badge on her chest, and everything was resolved.

Ooh, as expected of a Pivoine!

When I clapped my hands, the corners of her mouth lifted into a smile.

Huh. Was this girl actually pretty weak to flattery?

*
*

That same day we stayed back after school to tally up the print-outs.

Kisshouin was tapping away at her flashily decorated calculator when she let out a tired sigh.

“Are you feeling unwell?” I asked.

“Eh…? Ah, no, I am fine.”

It didn’t look like it though.

Her trademark curls were even looking a little flat.

I suddenly recalled what Akizawa said about giving her sweets.

After fishing through my bag for a while I pulled out a cheap Tirolian chocolate.

Would she even eat this?

I decided to test it anyway.

“Kisshouin-san, would you like some chocolate?”

“My! This is a Tirolian chocolate!” she said as a sparkle returned to her eyes. “Oh? Have I seen this flavour before…?”

So she knew what they were.

“Apparently it’s region-limited. I got it off someone as a souvenir.”

“Region-limited!? Heavens! To think that I had forgotten those existed… What a grievous oversight…!”

Eh? What was?

I watched her clench her fist in regret for a while before she accepted the chocolate from me and popped it in her mouth.

Her expression instantly changed into a blissful smile.

“As expected of a limited edition. Yummy…!”

“I see. Good for you.”

The chocolates were pretty small, so they didn’t take long to finish.

She looked a little forlorn that it was over, so I asked her if she wanted another one.

“I am fine. One was plenty. Thank you for the treat.”

“Are you sure? I still have a bunch left, so you don’t have to hold back.”

“…Truly? Well, if you say as much, could I trouble you for just one more?”

And that was how Kisshouin-san happily ate another region-limited chocolate.

It was surprising how happily she’d eat cheap chocolate.

She was part of the Pivoine so I would have expected her to be more picky. Maybe only eating from companies with royal warrants to European royalty or something.

“Thank you very much, Satomi-kun. I know just how valuable that was. You have a generous heart.”

“Huh? Oh, nah, you’re exaggerating. It was just a bit of chocolate.”

“My, I have heard that a bit of chocolate has saved someone stranded in the mountains before. You must not forget its worth.”

We’re smack bang in the middle of Tokyo, Kisshouin-san.

Anyway, having finished her 10 yen chocolate, Kisshouin-san produced a rather flashy-looking thimblette from her pencil case and began working again with renewed vigour.

Just what the hell was in that chocolate.

Akizawa hadn’t been exaggerating.

A few days later, Kisshouin-san approached me while looking left and right for witnesses.

Sidling up to me, she slipped a small package into my hand.

“Quickly! Hide it before we are spotted! Now! DEWIT!”

Eh… Kisshouin-san was an illegal goods dealer?

It was against my principles to get involved with that…

I snuck a look into the package and saw Tirolian chocolates decorated with cute mascots.

Mmn. These goods were undoubtedly legal.

“What’s this about?”

“Shh! Be silent! Think of this as a sign of my appreciation, just between the two of us, all right? It was something I obtained through special channels.”

“…The black market?” I tried.

“The internet.”

That’s just mail delivery, Kisshouin-san.

“If you need more, just let me know,” she whispered before slinking away.

For a moment I saw a future criminal being led away in cuffs.

Be careful you don’t get stopped by the police, Kisshouin-san~

*

*

As we continued working together as class representatives, I gradually began to realise that despite her lofty position and social power, the girl herself was fun to talk to, and a little bit air-headed.

I began to see how far I could push her before she got angry, but the answer was ‘pretty far’.

Even if she did get a little mad, in the end an apology and a dessert would be all it took for her to say,

“Honestly, Satomi-kun~ Just this once, all right?”

The Queen of the Pivoine was weak to bribery.

One day I caught her staring at my hair.

“Is that your natural hair colour? It looks like you have used a little dye.”

“Ah, you realised?”

“That is against the rules,” she grinned at me.

“Well what about your curls, Kisshouin-san? Isn’t that a perm?”

“These are natural,” she insisted.

Liar.

Closer to the root it wasn’t curly at all. Geez, no choice.

“Please find it in your heart to overlook me, just this once.”

I pushed the bite-sized donuts I bought this morning towards her.

“You are quite the sinful one,” she said, grinning wickedly like some corrupt magistrate.

The Queen of the Pivoine could be bought over with 100 yen sweets.

*

*

I continued poking fun of her after that.

One day I was making my way down an empty hallway when suddenly I was grabbed by each arm.

Holding me on the left and right were the Pivoine Queen’s closest aides, Kazami Serika and Imamura Kikuno.

“You. The way you have been behaving towards Reika-sama has been becoming unacceptable.”

“You had better not forget your place.”

…Was I going to disappear into the abyss!?

Could it be that most of Kisshouin-san’s scary image was because of these two?

*

*

One day Kisshouin-san asked me a difficult question.

“Satomi-kun, did you know that people have been nicknaming me?” she frowned.

Geeehhhh! Why did she know that!?

I pretended to be calm as I asked her where she heard that.

Apparently it had been Mizusaki that had told her.

Why would you tell the person herself, Mizusaki!?

Was that guy an idiot!?

Kisshouin-san had quite a few nicknames.

Most of them were related to her appearance, including “Maki Maki Makkie” and “D(olly Gi)rll”, but the one we used the most was “Goddess Kali” after the Indian goddess of slaughter and destruction.

It was originally because of her curled hair, and how scary she was supposed to be when she got angry, but obviously I couldn’t tell that to Kisshouin-san herself!

But then after the name became popular, we wondered that if she was Kali, who was the Shiva she was supposed to be dancing on!?

Could it be one of those two…!?

Everyone wondered, but nobody had the guts to comment. After all, nobody was stupid enough to want to make an enemy out of the three greatest powers in the Pivoine.

All of us wanted to graduate safely…

*

*

“You okay, Satomi?” Mizusaki suddenly asked from behind.

At the moment our two classes were having P.E. together.

“Why are you asking?”

“You’re class representative with that Kisshouin Reika girl, right? Have you been having a lot of problems?”

“None at all.”

It seemed like he didn’t have such a good impression of her.

Not that I could blame him, given her image.

I used to be the same way after all.

Still…

“She’s probably not the kind of girl you think she is. Kisshouin-san takes being a class representative more seriously than I do. You know she brings her own thimblette for sorting handouts? She even gave me one. It’s this flashy thing with hearts and glitter on it.”

I basically regurgitated what Akizawa told me.

“…Huh.”

“Ah! That reminds me! Why the hell did you tell her about her nicknames!? You’re shortening my lifespan here!”

“Yeah, my bad. I realised that I shouldn’t have right after I said it.”

What the hell! Be more careful, damn it!

I’m seriously going to disappear into the abyss at this rate!

*

*

For the athletics carnival she dressed up as a mouse, and then for the school festival she dressed up as a sheep butler without complaint.

It was nice how happily she went along with things.

By this point I didn’t find her scary at all.

But unlike the girl herself, her followers flooded us with complaints.

“What’s the meaning of this!? Reika-sama is being dressed up as a mouse!”

Even after she persuaded her friends, when they saw the mascot costume she was going to wear they blew up again.

“She can’t wear a mascot costume! Are you trying to turn her into a giant rat!?”

“A giant rat…? They’re going to turn Reika-sama into a coypu!”

“At least try and aim for a cute hamster!”

But Kisshouin-san didn’t seem too unhappy when she had stood in front of the mirror and waved her butt around to move the tail~

In the end we compromised and went with a grey dress and mouse ears.

It wasn’t much of a costume but the event was a success in the end, so all went well.

I made a number of enemies amongst the girls, though…

When she put on the sheep ears for the school festival, we got a lot of customers who came to see something scary, as well as a number of VIPs thanks to Her Majesty’s connections.

With the three great powers of the Pivoine there, the hallway became packed with students.

Thanks to that, Café Sheep Dolly had incredible sales. As the class rep, I couldn’t be happier.

The death glares from her followers were a bit scary though…

Ah, something else of note was that at some point Iwamuro became acquainted with her too. It was a completely unexpected combo.

*

*

When we switched classes going into 3rd year I ended up with Kisshouin-san again. Not only that, the two of us were the class representatives again.

What was dangerous was that Kazami and Imamura were in the same class too, but luckily there was nobody else troublesome.

More importantly, with Kisshouin-san here, nobody was reckless enough to voluntarily start trouble.

I had thought the year was going to be smooth sailing, but there was one person who was acting suspiciously.

The dude seemed to be trying his hardest to curl into a ball.

“What’s wrong, Tagaki?”

If I was remembering right, Tagaki was an External Student that had joined in high school.

“If something’s up, you can tell me. I mean, I am the class rep and that.”

Tagaki turned his head here and there to make sure of something, before nervously answering me.

“The truth is…” he began his story.

Huh. Come to think of it, the guy who accidentally ran his mouth during that incident was this guy.

It was something that happened near the end of our 2nd year.

Takamichi Wakaba was an External Student on a scholarship.

Somebody had graffitied her locker, and somebody claimed that it was Kisshouin-san’s bullying.

In the end it turned out that Kisshouin-san had been resting in the infirmary, and was heading back to class when she noticed the locker.

Coincidentally, classes had just ended, so other students had spotted her standing by the locker as they left their classrooms, but it wasn’t like they had caught her actually doing the vandalism…

Speaking of Takamichi Wakaba, her position at Zui’ran was a little awkward.

While Zui’ran was a school filled with the children of Japan’s most wealthy, Takamichi was just a girl from an average household who won a scholarship through outstanding grades.

Not to say that alone was enough to make things awkward, but her grades happened to be good enough to threaten the position of Zui’ran’s poster boy, our flawless Emperor.

It wasn’t a pleasant matter for a lot of Internals.

The finisher was that that same Emperor, who had never before shown any interest in the girls that approached him, had now taken an interest in her.

Apparently Takamichi had been harassed by jealous girls, and that hero of justice Mizusaki began standing up for her too.

Of course this just made her all the more detestable to the girls.

Not that I could blame them…

The Emperor is one thing, but you should think things through a little more, Mizusaki.

So to conclude, she had great grades, and the three most popular guys were paying attention to her.

These weren’t anything to fault her for, but jealousy knows no reason. Girls began slandering her as sucking up to men, and frustrated guys who were beaten by her joined in as well.

Even the previous president of the Pivoine had begun targeting her, but Kisshouin-san stayed neutral like it was none of her business.

I wasn’t that well-informed about girl drama, but apparently Kisshouin-san leaned towards sympathy for her.

Well, that was the background for the locker incident. Tsuruhana’s group took the opportunity to blame it on Kisshouin-san.

Naturally she denied it, but it was a little sketchy because she was actually holding the marker.

Honestly, what were you thinking, Kisshouin-san…?

Things were looking pretty bad for her but the victim herself outright shot down the accusation, so in the end it didn’t go beyond suspicions.

I myself made sure to have a word with Mizusaki.

“Kisshouin-san might be a bit of an oddball, but she’s not the type to do things like this.”

Back in 1st year he hadn’t had a great impression of her, but contrary to my worries he nodded.

“…Yeah, you’re right.”

In our boys hierarchy, the Emperor was sitting firmly at the top, so things were pretty peaceful. In contrast, Tsuruhana would occasionally start trouble to try and topple Kisshouin-san, so incidents popped up from time to time.

She had been the leader of a failed revolt back in middle school as well.

We named it the ‘Tsuruhana Rebellion’, but after the locker incident it was renamed to the ‘Tsuruhana Spring Rebellion’.

After all, the locker incident had turned into the ‘Tsuruhana Winter Rebellion’.

The Tsuruhana Winter Rebellion was a revolt in the second year of high school led by Tsuruhana’s group, who had been defeated in a previous Rebellion. It culminated in a massive three-way battle in the cafeteria between Kisshouin-san’s forces, Tsuruhana’s forces, and members of the Student Council.

A few guys had been sent crazy glares when they said “Girls are damned scary…”.

Were these supposed to be the same girls that people knew as ojousama?

The one who stopped it in the end was Zui’ran’s absolute monarch, the Emperor.

In the days that followed, I wondered whether this would finally put an end to the trouble started by Tsuruhana’s group.

That was when I happened to chance across Enjou-kun calling Tsuruhana herself out into an empty hallway. I could faintly hear his voice while I was passing by.

“I usually don’t get involved in arguments between girls, but you’ve gone a little overboard this time. Just letting you know, but if you continue slandering Kisshouin-san then I’ll be taking her side, so what do you intend on doing?”

So that was how the ‘Tsuruhana Winter Rebellion’ came to a close.

And because of her two revolts, she ended up with the nickname the Taira-no-Masakado of Zui’ran. Incidentally one of the three most powerful wraiths in all of Japan…

Why did the girls in our grade all have such terrifying nicknames…?

Anyway, bringing the topic back to Tagaki, he was afraid of retribution because of his involvement in it.

To be fair his careless remark really did cause a lot of people to suspect her, but I didn’t think Kisshouin-san was the type to cling onto grudges like that.

“Have you apologised to her properly?”

“Y-Yeah… We both went to a Spring cram course together, so I apologised there. And on the advice of one of her friends, I also gave her some pudding as an apology…”

“Did she forgive you?”

“She said that she didn’t mind at all…”

“Isn’t that fine then? She accepted your pudding, right?”

“Well… yeah…”

In my experience, an apology and a dessert was enough for her to forgive you for most things.

“It’ll be fine,” I said with a clap on the back. “Why are you so damned scared anyway? You’re as white as a sheet. C’mon, it’s lunch soon. Try eating something sweet and cheer up, yeah?”

“Yeah… You’re right. Maybe I’ll go for some pudding myself.”

“Right? Just relax.”

Tagaki did as I suggested and ordered a custard pudding.

That was when Kisshouin-san’s group entered the cafeteria.

“Reika-sama, what are you having today?”

“Crema catalana was recently added to the menu, so I was thinking of enjoying some today.”

Crema Catalana is very similar to a Crème Brûlée, the chief differences being that in a crema catalana the custard uses only milk and no cream, and that in a crema catalana the custard is not baked in a bain-marie water bath.

“Ahh! Come to think of it, it’s been your favourite recently.”

“It has. I was looking forward to having it again,” she smiled happily.

Unfortunately she was struck by cold reality.

“I’m sorry. Somebody ordered the last one just a moment ago.”

Immediately she became unsteady on her feet.

“Reika-sama! Please hang in there!”

“Who was it that obstructed Reika-sama from enjoying her lunch!?”

Fuujin and Raijin glared into the crowd in search of the culprit who had taken the last one.

It was Tagaki…

The pudding that Tagaki had ordered was the crema catalana that Kisshouin-san had been looking forward to.

Tagaki… You really have the worst timing… And you even started eating the pudding before you touched your actual lunch…

Were you that worn out?

The guy himself was pale, frozen with his spoon in his mouth. I mentally made the sign of the cross.

Stay strong, Tagaki.

*

*

The president of the Soccer Club was a guy named Azumi.

The Soccer Club at Zui’ran was one of our most famous clubs, and Azumi was its ace.

He wasn’t on the same level as the Emperor, but he still enjoyed popularity amongst the girls. You could say that he was pretty well-known here.

Unfortunately for him, ever since Kisshouin-san had christened him ‘Dainagon’, that popularity was in danger.

“Dainagon? As in the fat azuki beans?”

“Ahh, because his name is Azumi!”

“‘Sup, Beans?”

And that was how he was nicknamed Beans.

The man himself protested, “No! She’s not talking about the beans!” but it was too late for him, and the nickname settled. Poor guy…

Out of curiosity I asked the culprit about the origins of the name, but she responded with a look of surprise.

“My! I would never give a pet name based on a pun like that. It is a dignified name with noble origins, named after the Kemari Dainagon who lived during the Heian Period, known for his prowess in kemari football.

“To think that you all thought it was a pun… Ah, speaking of azuki red beans though, how do you prefer your ohagi? Koshian or tsubuan? Incidentally, I prefer koshian.”

Ohagi are sticky rice balls covered in sweet red bean paste. The paste is fine and smooth in koshian ohagi, and rough and coarse in tsubuan ohagi.

“Eh? Ahh… If I had to say, I guess tsubuan?”

“My. Then how do you prefer your sakuramochi? Choumeiji style or Doumyouji style? Incidentally, I prefer Choumeiji.”

Sakuramochi is a Japanese sweet consisting of sweet pink-colored rice cake (mochi) with a red bean paste center, and wrapped in a pickled cherry blossom leaf. Eaten during the spring, especially on hinamatsuri, or at flower viewing parties. The ball-style Doumyouji is endemic to the Kansai region, while the wrap style Choumeiji is the traditional style for the Kantou region, including Tokyo.

“Ahh… I suppose I prefer the one with the skin folded around the red bean.”

“The same as myself, it seems. Then when it comes to the leaf, are you the type who eats it, or…?”

Even though we were supposed to be talking about Dainagon Azumi’s name, somehow it turned into a conversation about sakuramochi leaves…!?

And then ‘speaking of leaf-wrapped desserts’, whether I preferred sakuramochi or kashiwamochi?

The topic of Azumi was kicked aside just like a soccer ball.

Farewell, Azumi.

“You’re kind of a weird aren’t you, Kisshouin-san?” I couldn’t help but mutter.

“Huuh!?” Her eyes shot wide. “What do you mean weird!? Even though I’m so normal!? Even though I’ve never been called weird before!?”

“Ah, my bad! You’re right.”

“Of course I am!”

Sometimes you get people who say stuff like “I’m a bit weird, after all~” but they’re basically just boring people who wished they were weird. The real weirdos have no idea that they’re weird.

Nobody was allowed to use the word “weird” around the real weirdo, Kisshouin-san.

But just look behind her. Her friends were all sneaking worried glances at her.

*

*

We had our class trip in early May. There were some odd jobs to do as the class rep on the trip, but the two of us didn’t have any trouble.

Apparently our class was the exception in that respect.

I heard about it from Mizusaki when we bumped into each other during the trip.

“Have you been having any problems with people breaking curfew, or anybody going overboard? The other classes are having huge problems with it.”

“Huh~ Come to think of it, I’ve been hearing that too. But nah, the one who takes the night roll is Kisshouin-san~ Nobody would be stupid enough to break curfew.”

To begin with, most of the girls in the class were already happy to cooperate with Kisshouin-san, so they wouldn’t do anything to bother her. As for the guys, nobody was gutsy enough to make an enemy of all the girls by angering her.

Besides, if there was anyone who went overboard because they were having too much fun, it wouldn’t take long for somebody to rat them out. It was on par with a country with secret police.

“Is this the Reign of Terror or something?”

Curfew-breaking will be purged. May the Kisshouin Reika dictatorship reign supreme.

*

Kisshouin-san seemed to be angry at me after I brought up the ghost story of the Tower of London.

I rather liked ghost stories, but the opposite seemed true for her.

And for some reason she was clenching both hands unnaturally.

Eh, don’t tell me she was hiding her thumbs?

Wasn’t that what primary schoolers did when they saw a hearse!?

But since her reaction was so funny, I continued messing around with her.

I guess that made me a primary schooler too.

When we were at the Vatican I brought up the catacombs, since that seemed like something she’d be weak with.

As expected I was rewarded with a glare before she began stalking off.

As she was leaving I realised that the hair swaying against her back kind of looked like the number 6.

“Hmm? Kisshouin-san, together some of the curls on the back of your head turn into the number of the beast, you know?”

She turned around with a startled look.

“Where on earth do you think we are! This is the headquarters of Christianity, you know! Show some restraint!” she scolded.

Sorry.

From that moment until when we left the Vatican, Kisshouin-san would occasionally hold her hair down, looking left and right like a suspicious person.

I think she was worried inquisitors would come for her.

To disguise the 6’s in her hair, Kisshouin-san would make little micro-shakes of her head, but in the end she got dizzy and needed her girls to support her.

Ah geez…

*

After sightseeing Rome, it was time for dinner.

I turned in surprise as I felt something strike my back out of the blue.

It was Kisshouin-san, who was for some reason standing in a pitching position.

Apparently she had thrown something at me. I rubbed the place where I had been hit and- eh, uwah! What were these weird grains?

White… powder…?

Are you serious? Some even got in my hair! It looked like I had dandruff now!

Come on, give me a break…!

But after dinner, Kisshouin-san’s girls finally called me out for a chat.

“How dare you show Reika-sama such disrespect!”

“Unforgiveable!”

“It’s because of you that Reika-sama has been behaving strangely!”

After a lengthy session of being chewed out by them, they all began to smile darkly.

Scary…!

“Satomi Yukinari. From what I heard, it seems you have a girlfriend in Second Year.”

“Eh-!? How’d you know that!?” I blurted.

“Do not make light of our information network,” I was warned.

“It seems that you intend on buy her a souvenir in Paris,” somebody else continued.

“Matching accessories, was it?” another mused.

So this was why people feared the secret police…!

The ring of girls around me tightened.

My back was to the wall, with nowhere to run.

“You have a lovely girlfriend,” I was told neutrally.

“Ah, well…”

“I trust you have not forgotten that Reika-sama’s cousin Ririna-san is in Second Year.”

“And that Ririna-san adores Reika-sama.”

“It wouldn’t take much to break you up.”

They were taking her hostage…

“If you understand, then have a good think about your attitude towards Reika-sama.”

“If you want to enjoy the rest of your high school days, that is.”

“Your abuse has greatly saddened Reika-sama!”

“I understand,” I said. “I am reflecting. I’m very sorry.”

It was never a good idea to go against a group of girls, so I obediently lowered my head.

“By the way, what was that white stuff that Kisshouin-san threw at me?”

Even with my friends helping me, I had a lot of trouble getting it off.

I could actually still feel some, so I wanted to take a shower already.

“…It was salt.”

“Hah? Salt!? Where did you get so much salt?”

She couldn’t have brought it with her from Japan, right? It was a huge fist full, after all.

Even Kisshouin-san wouldn’t.

But then where did she get it?

“W-, Who cares about that!” one of them changed the subject.

“More importantly, you had better start paying Reika-sama the respect that she deserves!”

“Just who do you think Reika-sama is!?”

“Eh…?”

Well, she was obviously…

“My friend.”

Kisshouin Reika, that soft-hearted, earnest weirdo with a weakness to praise, was my friend.

]]>https://oniichanyamete.moe/2019/01/08/kenkyo-kenjitsu-the-reika-sama-chronicles-226-satomi-yukinari/feed/109oniichanyameteImage result for coypu05 – The Choicehttps://oniichanyamete.moe/2019/01/06/05-evolution/
https://oniichanyamete.moe/2019/01/06/05-evolution/#commentsSat, 05 Jan 2019 14:50:28 +0000http://oniichanyamete.moe/?p=13514Continue reading 05 – The Choice→]]>“Secret alpha tester No. 78. Time elapsed: 71 hours. Delirium, leading to mental collapse. As per procedure, subject will be forced to log out and moved to the collection room.”

Here, at the 7th research center of a certain conglomerate, 100 so-called “secret alpha tester” human subjects were undergoing an experiment within the MMORPG, “World of Yggdrasia”. Over 50 staff members were monitoring them 24/7, with ten persons each shift.

After the staff member’s announcement, the collecting process began in another facility. Subject No. 78 was thawed and released from the VR capsule. The medical staff carried the kid away in indifference.

Brian, the deputy director of this particular research center, watched the process through a monitor. He sighed and clicked a few buttons.

“So how many does this make?”

“Including No. 78, we have had 8 people logging out due to mental collapse. Another 2 died from their minds weakening.” His secretary, a gorgeous woman nearing her thirties, answered stoically.

The mental strain of using a different VR avatar from one’s real body first became a problem several years ago, and it had only gotten worse with the advance in VR technology. Increasing realism went hand-in-hand with an increasing number of reported mental instability.

As present, there were only three solutions.

First, was to simply lower the sensitivity of the VR system. This was not practical due to how indispensable VR had made itself in so many aspects of society, not to speak of the users’ ever-increasing demand for realism.

Second, to get used to the experience with the help of drugs and medical supervision. However, the user still needed to train for a long period of time, and success was not guaranteed. This solution also caused several other problems such as possible drug addiction and difficulty in returning to society, and thus was also impractical to implement.

Third, to minimize the differences between the user and their avatar. This was the simplest, problem-free solution, and so became the standard choice.

The 7th center’s focus was on exploring the effect of non-human avatar use on the human mind. For this purpose, the center had acquired orphans within the age of 10 to 15 for their still-flexible minds, and the fact that they had no relatives. These kids had had their records ‘legally’ deleted from the system. Upon the conclusion of this experiment, they would have their livelihood guaranteed for ten years and new identities made.

Monster avatars, with their unnatural powers and movement, took quite some time to make, which delayed the project. In the end, the secret alpha testers began their experiment at the same time the official beta testers joined the game. Depending on the results, this experiment could be a large step forward for the medical field.

“So, ten percent dropped out after just 70 hours.”

“Sir, I believe the cause might be the lack of sleep. At maximum, VR sensitivity even surpassed real life, which put so much stress on their minds that they couldn’t rest. Should we lower it?”

“That’d be putting the cart before the horse. If sensitivity is low, we might as well be using remote-controlled drones or AI tanks. As weapons, they’d be useless.”

Brian snorted. He looked at the large monitor showing the mental states of the 100 test subjects, updated in real-time.

“Sir, I’ve just received a report. A berserk alpha tester had made contact with a few beta testers, then defeated after a fight broke out.”

“Which one?”

“Excuse me. It was the alpha tester who started as a goblin and advanced into a hobgoblin. The beta testers who defeated them was a party of four, but they also suffered one casualty.”

“I see. As foreseen, the closer to human the avatar, the faster their evolution. So how many subjects have reached evolution?”

“Twenty-seven. Among them, one had died and four more have had a mental collapse, so currently twenty-two are still logged-in. However, over half of them are extremely unstable. Some of them are delirious, or have gone berserk.”

“Yes, increased stress due to a sudden change of form. Worst case scenario, we may need to look into injecting a few of them…”

Once a monster player raised their levels enough, they can evolve into another type of monster within the same evolution tree.

Anyway, I needed more details. I focused my thoughts on the Evolution Available part, and more text appeared.

Available Evolutions from [Infant Demon] 46/99
Displaying current choices.[Imp]
[Shadow][Gremlin][Ghast]

There were quite a few choices… I’d have to check them out one by one. My Crystal only had half its uses left, yet I still hadn’t learned the skill. Worrying was just futile, I know, but I couldn’t help myself.

[Imp] 45/99

A tiny, hideous demon. Lives in people’s houses, and loves to play pranks.

That explanation was much too short! It didn’t even say anything about the next evolutions. So useless.

…whatever. Might as well finish off the rest.

[Shadow] 44/99

A demon of shadows. Takes over the place of a living being’s shadow. Disturbs the mind of the possessed.

[Gremlin] 43/99

A type of evil fairy. Possesses inventions of man, and interferes with operation.

[Ghast] 42/99

A gaseous demon. Formed from a collection of black dust and soot. Can transform into many different shapes.

Hmmm… I guess if I wanted a typical demon, I should go the Imp path? But it’s ugly… I didn’t know how powerful they could get, but the size didn’t assure me.

I was slightly partial to the Shadow. If they could possess human shadows, then they might be able to enter human villages. Ah, but what if I turned white again after my evolution?

Gremlins also seemed to be a straightforward choice, but what exactly are ‘inventions’? Could I possess an airship and drop it? This had the potential for mass murder, but would I have to attack humans?

Ghasts were the most mysterious one. What do I do with the ability to change shapes?

All of them had their pros and cons. None of them seemed to be useful in a straight fight. What should I do?

Anyway, it looked like I couldn’t evolve if my magic wasn’t full so for the time being, it was time to rest. I decided to laze about in the clearing to calm myself down – all this time, this sense of disconnect had been putting my mind off-balance. Maybe I could watch the flowers.

You could say I was just escaping from reality, but, well, I’m a very experienced escapist. Really, I wish those company people would just lower the sensitivity already…

My mind wandered, until it landed on the caterpillar corpses. They were seriously cramping my style, here. Could I use them for something?

They did have those fangs that no bugs should ever have. Maybe I could rip them out and sell them in a town, somewhere? A monster selling monster materials. I’d be turning a lot of heads. Well, I had some free time, might as well try.

I approached the dark-red. Up close, the huge corpse looked a lot more grotesque than I thought.

I wasn’t really in the mood to carefully dismantle it, so I just stretched out a gooey tentacle to start pounding. It wasn’t so much dismantling as pulverizing. Which still worked – I got one out of the pair of fangs. It looked quite sturdy. Also, the other fang broke.

I didn’t want to look at this aftermath of a splatter movie, but I couldn’t close my eyes. Which might have been for the better, since otherwise I wouldn’t have noticed the twinkling object inside the corpse.

What was this thing? A gem? It was the size of a bean and colored black, which made it look more like a really nice piece of coal rather than a gem. I tried poking it, and suddenly it disappeared inside my body. Eh? What happened? Where did it go?

I searched everywhere in my body but found nothing. Instead, I noticed my depleted magic power recovering at a far faster rate.

What was that? A magic-emitting rock? Well, if it could recover my magic, then all the more convenient. I looked for stones inside the other three red caterpillar corpses too, but smashing them open revealed nothing.

Questions after questions. Did these stones only form inside strong monsters? Perhaps that was the ‘magic stone’ I was told about. Well, no matter. Thanks to the stone, I only took an hour to recover all my magic power.

Hey, dark-red. I’m not going to say I was grateful for the fight, but… it wasn’t meaningless.

Likely as not, there’d be more difficulties ahead of me no matter which path I choose. My worn-out soul might just be in tatters by the end, yet still, I didn’t want everything I had done to be meaningless.

And so, I gave form to my desire in my mind and made a wish with all my heart.

Well, I needed to get strong enough to win against the caterpillars anyway. I wouldn’t be able to leave the forest otherwise.

I could use [Reroll] twice now, but its usefulness was still very much in doubt. The ability to retry after a failure sounded amazing at first, but the only success I’d had with this skill was the time I forced the caterpillar to miss its biting attack. Furthermore, when rerolling, there was still the possibility that I’d fail again. Also, the skill used the specific words “required magic power”, which probably meant that the more powerful the attack I used it on, the more magic it’s going to take. 10 magic points was just for dodging the caterpillar’s bite.

And finally, I was a spiritual life-form. My combat ability would drop like a rock if my magic went low.

…so I supposed my unique skill would have to stay unused for the time being. Perhaps it could be a trump card.

There were a few new discoveries.

Total Combat Power of monsters and creatures which had hit points didn’t drop when they lost magic power, but did when they lost a large amount of hit points. Such creatures normally didn’t look very powerful. Only when they entered combat and spent magic would they exert power equivalent to their Total Combat Power.

In contrast, spiritual life-forms like me didn’t have hit points, because our magic was our life force itself. Both my magic and Total Combat Power would drop upon receiving damage. In return, magic points regenerated faster over time than hit points, and I could always attack with the full power of my Total Combat Power without spending magic.

Spiritual life-forms weren’t actually that weak. Still, I couldn’t help but felt it unfair.

Also, there were still no signs I’d come any closer to learning [Identification].

That was my situation. For the time being, I planned on continuing to gain as much strength as I could.

Currently, for a flawless victory against the snakes, I would need to attack from ambush. I’d like to get strong enough to win without a scratch in a head-on fight, at least.

I moved through the forest, slowly enough to not get dizzy, while wondering if there was any convenient prey nearby. Then, I spotted a presence some distance away. I focused my 360-degrees-fullscreen vision upon that direction.

Ah, that’s a red caterpillar. The woods gave way to a small clearing of sunlight and flowers. There the caterpillar lay, chewing on a few petals.

Huh, surprisingly powerful. Wait, it had a scar on its back. Could it be the same red caterpillar that killed me the first time? It had a darker shade now, though.

I see… it killed me to level up, didn’t it?

What should I do? It was stronger than me, so I didn’t really want to fight it. Since my death, I had already regained my strength and then some. Another death penalty would hurt a ton.

Yet at the same time, I wasn’t sure if I would ever have the chance to meet the same caterpillar again, in the same forest. I still remembered very clearly the pain of having my body shaved away, bit by bit.

If possible, I wanted my revenge.

Both of us had gotten stronger since then, but I also learned how to move my body and how to fight. A straight fight wouldn’t be easy. I might be able to win with an ambush, if I do it right.

My chances weren’t zero. Its combat power was only 20% higher. A strong first hit from ambush should give me the advantage.

And finally, I was the faster one now. I could just run away if the fight turned out bad.

I made my decision and climbed up a nearby tree. From branch to branch I moved, approaching my target. The red caterpillar was right in the center of a flower bed, which had no trees growing, but the clearing was only 5 meters large. I should be able to reach it by jumping from a protruding branch.

Wriggling, oozing, following the branches. I’d gotten used to the way this body moves, but that nauseous feeling of disconnect was still there.

I took aim… and… now!

I flew from the branch. As I dropped down right on top of the red caterpillar, I stretched out a whip of dough and slammed on its back.

Good, that’s thirty percent gone. Not only that, it looked like I hit it right in its old wound and ripped it open, which staggered it and somewhat reduced its combat power. At this point, we were equal in power. With my superior speed, I held the advantage, if only slightly.

I landed, splattering myself on the flower bed. It looked at me and finally realized it was under attack. The red caterpillar roared in rage, its body turning a darker shade.

Wait, that’s not the normal screech it usually did…

And then I heard the answering shrieks. Around the flower bed arrived three more red caterpillars. Really? Really?

Were they minions? Subordinates? A harem? I once heard that in insects, the females are generally bigger, so was this a reverse harem? Damn bitch, you’ve let power gone to your head!

They were smaller and weaker than the first red – well, dark-red now – caterpillar I encountered, but still much stronger than the snakes.

The plan had failed. Time to run.

Four caterpillars in four directions, all coming for me. I jumped towards the one opposite the dark-red.

It screamed, raising its head like a snake and spat acid. I dodged, flying like a butterfly… if butterflies didn’t have wings and were made of soggy clay, anyway.

My tentacle smashed into its head. Oh, it hurt a bit. Did I hit its fang? Was there still acid left? Anyway, I should try to avoid attacking the face from now on.

It started to squirm and writhe, seemingly in a great amount of pain from my counterattack. Hey, squirm somewhere else, would you? You’re blocking my escape path.

Meanwhile, the other three had caught up.

A screech accompanied another projectile. Wait, fire? Fire, not acid?! That dark-red caterpillar just spat fire at me! Impressive range, too. The fire mercilessly burned both me and the red caterpillar. Such cruelty.

[NO NAME] 56/99[Magic Points: 22/26][Total Combat Power: 26/30]

Oh man, that was a lot of points gone. I couldn’t let this hit me again. The well-cooked red caterpillar restarted its spasms. Smelled delicious.

Meanwhile, another red caterpillar had caught up to me. Seemed like the smaller red caterpillars were faster than the dark-red one.

It chomped at me. I only barely managed to turn it into a glancing blow and counterattacked.

[NO NAME] 55/99[Magic Points: 20/26][Total Combat Power: 24/30]

I was going to get bogged down, at this rate. The last red caterpillar hadn’t come any closer, seemingly the careful type, while the dark-red spat fire once again. The bug I was fighting attempted another bite, caring not one whit for the approaching mass of flame. I moved, putting it between me and the projectile, and then fire covered the both of us.

[Reroll]

All the fire around me suddenly moved to light up the red caterpillar, while I was unharmed. Thank god it worked!

[NO NAME] 55/99[Magic Points: 10/26][Total Combat Power: 15/30]

And there was the expected crash in magic points and combat power. The damage might have been lower if I just let the projectile hit me, true, but that was part of the plan.

The caterpillar was near-death, now. All-out attack!

These bugs did seem to be quite soft, comparatively. After hitting the doubly-cooked red caterpillar a few times, the mist was released.

[NO NAME] 54/99[Magic Points: 16/33] 7↑[Total Combat Power: 21/38] 8↑

That was a good boost of power. Plus, my spent magic was replenished, if only a little bit.

Seeing its fallen comrade, the dark-red caterpillar howled.

Now even the careful caterpillar was joining the fight, seemingly scared of the wife’s anger. It circled around and spat acid at me. That was pretty smart, for a caterpillar. For a moment, I wondered if it was one of the other secret alpha testers, but despite the intelligence, it wasn’t human-smart.

I moved between the two bugs and squished myself down. Both of them spat out their respective projectiles at the same time, which only whiffed right above me and went on to hit each other.

The dark-red lost itself in its howling rage and changed target to the acid-spitter. I took the chance to finish off the very first burn victim of the dark-red.

[NO NAME] 53/99[Magic Points: 22/40] 7↑[Total Combat Power: 28/45] 7↑

I finally came close to the strength I first had at the beginning of this battle.

The dark-red screeched, attracting my attention. It just bit the acid-spitter to death. Aww… what a waste.

Currently, I was hiding inside a hollow tree trunk somewhere in the pitch-black forest, waiting for my magic to recover.

[NO NAME] [Infant Demon] 83/99

A nameless infant demon. A spiritual life-form. Extremely fragile.

[Magic Points: 7/10][Total Combat Power: 9/11][Unique Skill: Reroll]

I’d heard that when players die, they lose 10% of their stats, but then why did I lose a whole half of mine? Was it just how it work for monsters? Or was it just for spiritual life-forms like me? Damn it, I had no idea.

Could it be? Could it possibly be that spiritual life-forms were incredibly weak?

At least my magic recovered over time. I had just a single magic point when I respawned. At the time, I seriously thought there was no way to progress any further.

My body shrank due to losing half my magic, which allowed me to hide within a hollow tree. What should I do now…? If I immediately died again, my character would probably be deleted, right?

The AI said my inventory would be dropped at my point of death, but this Identification Crystal still stayed with me. I wasn’t sure why. Perhaps it was because the crystal was a basic item for new players, or perhaps because I kept it inside my body. Anyway, thank god for that.

There had been a few discoveries while I was holing up in this tree.

My magic recovered by 1 approximately each hour. I didn’t know if this was a flat increase of 1, or if it was a 10% recovery, since my current maximum magic was exactly 10. The things I could do would be different, depending on which it was.

After using [Identification] on a few wild animals passing by my tree, I found out something. If I lost all my magic power, it’s over for me, but when normal animals’ magic points dropped to zero, they just fainted. They only died when their hit points dropped to zero.

…is this normal?

Next, when normal animals lost some magic points, their combat power still stayed the same. However, their magic points would drop bit by bit when in combat. I didn’t know whether it was because they used magic to attack, because combat itself took magic power, or because they strengthened themselves magically.

I saw a snake attacking a squirrel. When the squirrel died, the snake sucked up some kind of mist from its corpse.

I could see pretty well despite the darkness. Was it just how the game was, or was it because I was a monster?

And finally, there was a drone beetle. It approached me, thinking I was some kind of tree sap and I killed it, but I didn’t get any stronger.

At any rate, I needed to find a way to fight. Judging from appearances, the only things weaker than that caterpillar that I could find were the ‘snakes’, the ‘field mice’, and the ‘squirrels’.

Which meant that the caterpillar was the weakest monster in this forest. And right now, I was much weaker than it.

Just using my unique skill, [Reroll], to make the caterpillar miss already ate up around 10 of my magic power, so it wasn’t practical at the moment.

But there was one good thing that came from that mess. All that desperate running around helped me get used to this body, and the nausea was much more tolerable now.

Not much of a silver lining, really.

Anyway, my next goal was to get strong enough to kill a squirrel.

***

There should be a way to leverage my doughiness, I thought. Which resulted in my current attempt to ambush a squirrel from above a tree. I dropped and covered it with my whole body.

At first, the squirrel violently resisted. It suffocated and stopped moving after a while, and I absorbed some kind of mist from it. Hmm, I didn’t feel anything different…

Huh, snakes were weak. Still stronger than me and squirrels, though. Also, Identification Crystal, you didn’t even put any thought into naming them, did you?

They hissed.

…can you two please do this somewhere else? You’re messing up my plans here. I could just not peep and go elsewhere, but I was afraid I’d accidentally run across another snake or caterpillar in the process.

Both of them were about the same strength. Perhaps that was why none of them were willing to back off and miss out on a fresh meal. They began fighting.

Both of them twisted, turned, and generally just tried to constrict the other. The fight looked… really boring. After some time, one of them finally landed a bite on the other’s neck.

Yup, boring. It kept biting for a while, then won the fight just like that. Again, the winner absorbed the mist-like thing from the loser.

So, I got stronger when I won and absorbed the mist. Was that mist the snake’s magic? Vitality? I guess I’ll just call it ‘life force’.

My guess – huh, it’d been a lot of guessing and hypothesizing, hadn’t it? – was that for monsters and animals that had physical bodies, their Total Combat Power enumerated the power they had only when they strengthened themselves with magic, while spiritual life-forms like me always fought with 100% of my Total Combat Power.

I had always thought spiritual life-forms to be weak, but if this hypothesis proved true, I needn’t be. Hopefully.

]]>https://oniichanyamete.moe/2019/01/05/03-my-rivals-were-squirrels-and-snakes/feed/2doctorlocker02 – The First Battlehttps://oniichanyamete.moe/2019/01/05/02-the-first-battle/
https://oniichanyamete.moe/2019/01/05/02-the-first-battle/#commentsFri, 04 Jan 2019 14:46:54 +0000http://oniichanyamete.moe/?p=13487Continue reading 02 – The First Battle→]]>I sighed in relief. Finally managed to get inside the game. This ‘experiment’ thing was suspicious, admittedly, but it’d still be better living conditions compared to my former orphanage.

The aura of light covering me faded. My body, formerly human, was converted into the Demon avatar I chose.

Bright, too bright! My head hurt from the 360 degrees vision I now had. I was seeing from every part of my body, instead of just my eyes. I did get the explanation, but experiencing it myself was quite intense…

The closer the simulation got to reality, the worse the feeling of disconnect became. Apparently, just a few years ago, the syndrome didn’t even exist. Not surprising considering that at the time, VR couldn’t simulate smells, and systems only used vibration to fake the sense of touch.

The company said they wanted to implement ‘PvP between human and monster players’, but if processing visual information alone was this bad, I’m pretty sure it’s not going to happen any time soon. Well, I mean, I guess that’s why they needed testers…

Which reminded me, they said secret alpha testers would have their sensitivity to pain and the senses turned to maximum, but I’d hoped they would use my physical data to tweak the finer details. The problem was whether they’d do it before their data gathering finished or not… I probably shouldn’t have much hope here.

So, half a year. Half a year like this, with zero rest… I guessed that was why the AI said this race wasn’t recommended. Yet still, when it asked me what I wanted to be, this was the only choice I could think of.

My vision twisted and turned, like seeing through a kaleidoscope inside a churning whirlpool. Without the ability to even close my eyes, I decided to stay still for… somewhere around an hour. Finally, the feeling abated to a level I can bear. Perhaps my brain finally managed to process all this visual information.

Urgh… I felt like puking. My head still spun from the dizziness and nausea, but I couldn’t give up here. They wouldn’t allow the secret alpha testers to give up here.

Still, the rest was worthwhile. I could finally look around. And even I, a girl who normally kept a tight lid on her emotions, was amazed by what I saw.

I’d heard that you couldn’t distinguish VR games these days from real life, but this was far beyond what I expected. A light breeze, rustling leaves, shadows and dappled sunlight dancing on the ground, the wind carrying the smell of grass, of earth, and of water. All this, I felt.

This was a forest. Around me were trees, trees, and more trees. No signs of civilization anywhere. Nothing here…

No, wait. I was a ‘monster’ right now. I had a feeling bad things would happen if I got close to a human village. If this world was as realistic as was explained to me, human and monsters were enemies.

But I had more important things to worry about. The moment I understood what was around me, finally, I also understood what I was.

…a white slime? Not the bouncy, stretchy type, but a dripping, sticky slime made of thick liquid. I looked like somebody mixed up some watery dough or oobleck, then dropped the whole thing on the ground. How does this work? Could I move? I was drawing blanks on this body’s mechanics of locomotion.

It took me a few moments to realize there was a small, coin-sized piece of crystal on the ground near me. What was this thing…?

As I imagined stretching my arms, a piece of slime flew out and wrapped around the crystal.

Aaaahh… right. Don’t think about moving. Just do it.

At the same time, it didn’t actually feel like I was moving my arms, but rather, something shot out from my shoulder. It was terribly uncomfortable.

Anyway, the crystal. What was it? This perfect sphere couldn’t have naturally formed… oh, right, virtual reality. That meant it should be some kind of item…

[Identification Crystal] – 98/99

This crystal ball allows one to Identify one’s own power and other game items.

This is a bonus item for first-time players. One can buy a similar item in large cities, but they’re only usable 10 times.

Looking into the crystal allows one to know the general strength of the target.
※It may be possible to learn how to identify without a crystal. Do your best!

…an identification item?

I only thought about what this thing could be, and a message appeared inside my mind. What was this number? On a whim, I used the crystal to look at a nearby tree…

[Tree] 97/99[Magic Points: 5]

Yup, got it. The tree wasn’t a game item, so I couldn’t get any details on it. In contrast, the crystal was one, so there was plenty of information – at least, that was my standing theory. Magic points… was that the MP thing? Even trees had that? According to the extremely detailed language pack and game information pack installed in my mind, “the world was filled with mana”. This might be what it meant.

Wait, the number dropped… Was that “97/99” after the info box supposed to be the remaining uses of the Identification Crystal? It said I could buy something similar in towns, but monsters couldn’t enter towns, right?

“Possible to learn how to identify without a crystal…” I really hoped I could do that before I ran out of uses. At any rate, I still had to use it one more time. On me.

…so I guess I was pretty weak? The description did say “extremely fragile”, and I only had four times the magic points of a tree. I’d admit I hadn’t ever played a game before, but judging from the information jammed inside my head, wasn’t it supposed to show more details like my strength, speed, and whatnot?

Let’s see… if I remembered correctly, this game was about defeating enemies and getting stronger, right? Who is the enemy? Will they be easy enough opponents for me? Actually, how do I fight? Wait, more importantly, can I move at all?

I imagined myself moving forward… It worked, but eerghh, so nauseous…

That aside, I was curious about this Unique Skill thing. Sounded kinda cool. I started wondering about the details of the skill, and immediately some text appeared.

[Unique Skill: Reroll] 95/99

Uses up magic power. If activated upon a failed skill check, you will reroll the result.

The more severe the failure, the more the required magic power.

Bonus skill. Use of this skill is limited to secret testers.

I can use this… right? It said the skill was a bonus, but I was pretty sure they were just testing to see whether using it mentally affected the user or not anyway. Also, the skill itself wasn’t exactly surprising.

I knew why I have it.

I started moving. Every time I tried to go anywhere, it felt like being pushed from a cliff while blindfolded. After a while, I realized my surroundings had gotten dark.

…half a day and I probably didn’t even move more than 3 meters.

The nausea constantly assaulting me was my brain’s interpretation of the feeling of disconnect due to my extremely inhuman body. There was nothing wrong with my body, which was currently in cold sleep. It was all in the mind… so I could only power through it.

I wondered if the other secret alpha testers had to go through the same thing. I didn’t have a chance to have a decent talk with them, and I don’t think I ever would. One hundred of us, spread all over this huge world. The possibility of us meeting was infinitesimal.

A bigger problem here was encountering the ten thousand beta testers. I couldn’t speak at the moment, so it was likely I would just be killed on the spot if I ever met one of them. I couldn’t even run.

Dying several times in a row would get your character deleted. I’m sure the company wouldn’t allow me to try again if that happened, and I’d lose that paid-living-expenses-for-10-years reward, too.

Maybe they’d know I’m a player if I showed them my Identification Crystal…? Anyway, I should find somewhere safe before it got dar-

I heard something.

Some distance away from me was a red… thing. It looked like a caterpillar. It reared its head, like a snake trying to intimidate, and screeched.

Was it just an insect? Or perhaps… a monster? It looked strangely powerful, probably because of the scars I saw on its back.

Crap! The red caterpillar spat something at me. Yuck!

I tried to dodge – tried being the key word. The movement itself made me want to hurl. Next came the scorching heat and pain – as much as this body could recognize pain, anyway.

But the pain wasn’t the worst thing. No, it was the disturbing sense of my body eroding bit by bit. The feeling scared me so much I accidentally used the Identification Crystal.

[NO NAME] 94/99[Magic Points: 18/20][Total Combat Power: 20/21]

My magic power went down! My combat power, too!

Did spiritual life-forms have magic itself as their bodies?! And my combat power was tied to my magic?

I tried to run even as my mind was floundering in confusion, and the caterpillar gave chase. Holy hell were we slow, both of us! I oozed, it crawled. Yet it was still faster than me, even if only slightly.

]]>https://oniichanyamete.moe/2019/01/05/02-the-first-battle/feed/2doctorlocker01 – The World of Yggdrasiahttps://oniichanyamete.moe/2019/01/05/01-the-world-of-yggdrasia/
https://oniichanyamete.moe/2019/01/05/01-the-world-of-yggdrasia/#commentsFri, 04 Jan 2019 14:29:10 +0000http://oniichanyamete.moe/?p=13485Continue reading 01 – The World of Yggdrasia→]]>Author’s Note: Here’s my new series, and it begins with a VRMMORPG setting.

The starting arc is a bit dark, but the MC will be slowly getting stronger. Become the bunny girl you were meant to be, protagonist!

She’s 11 years old yet quite worldly in some aspects, so she doesn’t really act her age.

Well then, until she gets her vengeance, let us all watch over the journey of “The White Girl”.

“Yggdrasia welcomes you!”

Virtual reality (VR), as known to the public, began its first steps with a purely visual-and-aural-only system. In time, VR soon managed to replicate all sensations, and full-dive systems became the norm. The technology quickly made itself indispensable in a multitude of industries.

Some years later, the Avatar System was born: a technology that made use of Avatar bodies – crafted from electronics, special proteins and enzymes – to allow one to do dangerous work or journey the world from the comfort of their own homes through virtual reality.

And of course, it was also the heyday for VR games. Worlds of dreams and fantasy were realized upon servers, only limited by the human imagination. People waited with bated breath for the next invention, the next leap forward.

That was when a conglomerate, hailing from a certain first-world country, joined the VRMMO scene. They began recruiting beta testers for their MMORPG from all over the planet.

Created by a company famed for their work in the medical and defense industry and sponsored by the government, the game instantly became famous worldwide. Three millions people applied, fighting over the ten thousand slots allowed for the beta test. So grand, so fascinating was the newly-revealed world, that people wondered if this wasn’t actually interdimensional travel instead.

Applicants were chosen based on their age, sex, character, employment, education, health, criminal history, and other factors. And for the lucky ten thousand, what awaited them was the world they’ve been salivating over: Yggdrasia. A land centered around the towering World Tree, and ninety-nine of its saplings supported the continents with a combined size equivalent to Earth.

A tuxedo-clad stuffed dog appeared. The tester needed a guide to Yggdrasia, so the AI created one. The tester showed no reaction, and the guide kept quiet in return, until it found the right words, selected out of the millions of possible answers it has been programmed with.

“My, my. Young lady, you’re quite the adorable rabbit, aren’t you?”

She said nothing.

When the Avatar System was established, the biggest problem it encountered was the disconnect between the human controller’s perception and the avatar’s.

To put it simply, the disorder was caused by the differences between the human controller’s sex, physique, bone structure, height of field of view, length of limbs, or other such major characteristics and the avatar’s own. Subtle differences in facial details and hair colors, however, weren’t a problem. Even if their avatars did have major differences, no symptoms would show as long as the users keep their operation time short. It was constant, long-term avatar use that was the trigger, and in some cases, the user would start experiencing symptoms of mental rejections.

Once symptoms showed, as long as users rested for a few days without using VR, they would experience no lasting effects. But if they continued for several days, their psyches would begin to destabilize, with some users reporting nausea and anxiety.

The first solution to this problem was to lower the avatar’s sensitivity, but the decision was reversed after the deluge of complaints coming from users who had been spoiled by the realism. The simplest solution, as decided upon by the VR industry and the medical association, was just to warn users to “use an avatar as similar to yourself as possible”.

This decision prompted the VR device makers to began incorporating full-body scanners into their product as the standard, and most VR services strongly recommended their customers to copy their appearance to use as their avatars.

Of course, the game industry was no exception. Players were allowed some leeway through changing their age setting, but in most cases, their avatars were almost carbon copies of their real bodies.

Thus, our tester, as appeared in the AI guide’s room for her initial game settings, looked the same as her scanned body in real life. If there was a real human supervising this process, they would have immediately intervene when they heard the AI call the tester “an adorable rabbit”.

According to the AI’s preliminary information, the girl in front of it was a Japanese emigrant, 11 years old. Suffered from a congenital absence of pigmentation – an albino.

She was quite a bit smaller than the average for her age. She wore a simple white dress reminiscent of hospital gowns. Her arms and legs, peeking out from the dress, were barely better than twigs. On a closer look, you could see what seemed to be bruises dotting her white skin.

True, she could be considered cute, and true, her slightly scruffy white hair and scarlet eyes set into a permanent glare did make her look like a rabbit, but if an actual human with real emotions was to see her, they wouldn’t call her “cute”. They’d say she looked “pitiful”.

The albino stayed silent, showing no signs she heard the AI. After the required time had elapsed for the program, the stuffed dog changed its pose and began the next explanation.

“Well then, miss. Allow me to explain about the world of Yggdrasia!”

At the center of Yggdrasia was a giant, towering World Tree, and from it spawned ninety-nine Saplings to bless the lands. They attracted the race of Humans, and around the Saplings, thirty-three major and sixty-six minor countries formed out of the myriads of villages, towns, cities, and metropolitans. Population of major countries started from a few millions to tens of millions citizens, or for minor countries, hundreds of thousands to a few millions.

The Humans’ civilization looked like a mix of real-life medieval and early modern age history – if we ignored the existence of Magical Tools. Much like electrical appliances, these devices utilized Mana to serve the same purposes, and they were affordable enough even for most commoners. In larger cities, people could live, if not like a king, then at least quite comfortably.

Even carriages, trains, and ships used magical engines. Despite the world being Earth-sized, transportation and travelling were relatively simple.

Yggdrasia was filled with the power of magic, or to be more precise, Mana. Most combat centered around the use of melee weapons, magic, or rarely, single-shot magically-powered muskets.

All players were Humans, but Human was not the only race. There were also Elves, Dwarves, Beastmen, Dragonkins, and many other races of Demihuman. They lived in settlements and colonies deep inside forests and mountains, far away from Human countries. Next, there were Goblinoids and Monster races such as Goblins, Orcs, Ogres and more, who opposed all Humankind.

To raise the stakes, the game featured a death penalty: lowered magic power, 10% decrease in stats, and dropping inventory items. In case the player had not set a respawn point, they would revive at a random location near their former death. If the player died again without raising their stats back, their character will be deleted.

Pain was simulated, but only by 10%. Players would still feel the shock of being hit even if they lowered their pain setting to the minimum.

Criminal activities would be punished following the laws of the local country, with jail time as one of the possible punishments. Players could fight each other, but if they were caught by law enforcement (in case it was murder and not a consensual duel) and received a long enough sentence, their accounts would be deleted.

Playing as a criminal was allowed, but if you got on the wanted list, your activities would be severely restricted.

Speed of time in-game was practically the same as real time. Considering the size of the world itself, each area of the game had its own time zone.

“Did you get all of that? Well then, miss, to our next business. Normally, this is where beta testers start creating their characters, but since you are one of the secret alpha testers, you will be choosing your race. As per your contract, once the testing period ends, you will be required to maintain confidentiality and your living expenses for the next ten years will be fully covered.” The guide AI finished its speech.

Publicly, this experiment’s purpose was to “gather data in order to implement PvP between human players and monster players”. Purportedly, it examined the psyche of a user when they used an entirely non-human body, as well as the mental and physical stress of constant long-term VR use with the user’s body put into cold sleep. But there were another secret reason for this experiment.

Military use.

Alpha testers were given non-human avatars with the sensitivity set as high as the technology could allow, and forced to stay logged-in for half a year.

“Your choices for races are as follows: ‘Goblinoids’ – examples of this type would be Goblins and Kobolds. Other than that, you can choose between ‘Beast-type’, ‘Dragon-type’, ‘Plant-type’, but I would recommend…”

“…demon…” The white girl spoke for the first time.

“Excuse me?” the AI’s speech protocol started up a new dialogue, “I see. You would pick the Demon race, then? I do not recommend using a spiritual-body type of avatar, but if that is your choice… Well then, please go to the door over there. We will also begin installing the world’s common language pack on the way, so please stay calm.”

As the girl gave a slight nod and walked, the AI executed its final programmed action.

“Then I shall wish you a wonderful life in Yggdrasia! Oh, I almost forgot one last thing! Please tell me your name!” it called after the still-nameless girl, but she kept walking.

“…don’t need one,” she muttered.

Her final steps put her on a road of light leading into the world of the new VRMMORPG, Yggdrasia.

Author’s Note: The next chapter will be the start of the white girl’s life of surviving as a monster. It’s going to be written in first-person, for the most part. She didn’t say much in this chapter, but rest assured, she said a lot of things in her head :D.

Sorry for the massive delay. Really stressed at work, and then got sick twice, so I found it hard to do anything productive. Mostly just lazy gaming.

We’d even finished chapter 4.1 of the manga we’re translating, but nobody had enough effort to upload it for over 2 weeks.

But hey, at least it’s here before the Elder Scrolls 6, right?

The Inugami Clan

On his deathbed, ruthless pharmaceutical tycoon, Inugami Sahei, is surrounded by his family, including three grown daughters, by three women he never married, as well as an outsider, Tamayo.

Two of his daughters are accompanied by their husbands and sons, but the oldest, Matsuko, is alone.

When he dies before identifying his heirs, the will cannot be read until all the family is present, so Matsuko sends for her son, Sukekiyo.

When Matsuko’s son, Sukekiyo, arrives, his face is obscured by a skintight, white latex mask which arouses the suspicions of the other family members until Sukekiyo rolls up his mask uncovering a horribly burned visage.

Sahei unexpectedly leaves the family fortune to the attractive Tamayo on the condition that she marry one of the Inugami grandsons – Sukekiyo, Suketake , or Suketomo – pitting blood against blood. If she doesn’t, she will forfeit the inheritance.

“This ain’t right. We haven’t even gotten to the main topic yet! Don’t you want to know about it? How my Paris date went!”

“No, not particularly,” I said frankly, and was treated to a wide-eyed Kaburagi.

By his side, Enjou stifled a laugh.

“…Don’t you want to know? You want to know, right?”

“No, not particularly.”

“You don’t have to be shy. Don’t you want to know?”

“No, not particularly.”

Wow, what an unhappy look. Did he want to tell me about his fun date with Wakaba-chan that badly?

“…You’re my strategist. It’s your duty to know!”

“And as I have said before, I have no recollection of accepting that role.”

“…Isn’t your hair a god of love? It’s your duty to know!”

“And you have never left any offerings.”

What was with that pout.

Was he sulking or something?

What a gwumpy wittle boy, you are~

I wonder if he’d hit me if I said that.

“Now, now, we gave you some information too, so couldn’t you go along with Masaya for a bit?” Enjou persuaded. “As for those offerings, would the desserts from this café do? Tiramisu maybe? Would you prefer panna cotta? Shall I order both?”

Tiramisu is a coffee-flavoured Italian dessert. It is made of ladyfingers (savoiardi) dipped in coffee, layered with a whipped mixture of eggs, sugar, and mascarpone cheese, flavoured with cocoa.Panna cotta is an Italian dessert of sweetened cream thickened with gelatin and molded. The cream may be aromatized with coffee, vanilla, or other flavorings.

Uuu, tempting me with sweet things was cheating.

But since I was in Rome, I did want to try both…

Hang in there, Reika.

It’ll be dinner soon, and there are people watching.

Console yourself with just the tiramisu.

Enjou smiled. “A reporter for a gossip magazine, the host of a hair god of love. You sure have a lot of titles, Kisshouin-san.”

Shush, you.

Both of those were just forced on me by your best friend.

Oh! The tiramisu was coming!

Itadakimaaasu~

“Alright. You’ve had your offering, right? So anyway, about my date in Paris-”

“When we were in Japan they gave me a list of cakes that they wanted to try. They seemed so excited, asking if I thought they could go here or there while we were on the trip.”

“Ohh~”

He was trying to cover it with his fist, but I could still see him smirking like an idiot.

“We tried different flavours of macarons and talked about which one was best. Then since there were still too many things they wanted to try we ended up sharing them…”

By now the smirk he was trying to hide had turned into a full-blown grin.

Sharing a cake between two people was a nice, sweet, romantic cliché after all.

“Since the day after tomorrow is another free day, we’re planning to sneak off and try dessert touring again, you know. Today she said to me, ‘I had so much fun. Every one of the stores you recommended was delicious!’. Geez, that girl.”

“Ohh~”

His little date in Paris was an even better success than I’d expected.

The cool Emperor of Zui’ran was practically dancing for joy. I wouldn’t be surprised if he screamed ‘La vie en rose!’ at any moment.

That might have been what he did last night, actually.

“They loved the chocolat too. There are some good places in Japan, so I’m thinking of inviting them when we get back…

“As for good gelato places in Rome…

“They said they wanted to try pizza too, so I could take them to…”

Since I’d finished the tiramisu, I was wondering if I could head back to my room now.

Next to the gushing Emperor, Enjou was sipping at his cappuccino like it was none of his business.

Was this what he went through last night…? Friends could be such a pain sometimes.

After a while, Kaburagi had finally stopped to catch his breath so it was time to leave.

Oh? You still haven’t talked enough?

Well that’s none of my business. I’ve listened enough to make up for the offering already.

Just as I had gotten out of my seat, Enjou whispered into my ear.

“Rather than a couple, don’t you think that going around and touring dessert places sounds more like two girlfriends?”

Damned venomous schemer.

When I got back to my room I let the girls know that it was just an errand for mummy.

After our grade all had dinner together, for some reason Kaburagi passed me a box of assorted macarons on the way back.

Ladurée. 75 Av. des Champs-Élysées, 75008 Paris, France btw.

“Since you said you needed offerings, here, I’m sharing the joy. These are the macarons that they said were particularly delicious. Besides these there’s also…”

Apparently he was going to use the macarons as an excuse to talk about Wakaba-chan some more.

The way back to the hotel was filled with more of his sugar-sweet nonsense.

Enjou was right. It really was endless.

Speaking of Enjou…

He was standing a ways away, waving at me with a smile.

So he escaped.

Anyway, thanks to all of this, for the next few days there was a rumour that Kaburagi had been talking to me joyously after handing me a gift.

Such a nuisance!

Incidentally, the dessert for dinner that night was tiramisu.

I should have gone for the panna cotta…!

As for the macarons, I shared them with the girls.

*

*

Today we were sightseeing in Rome.

Amongst the places we visited were the Roman Forum,

the Mouth of Truth,

the Pantheon,

and the Colosseum.

The whole day was packed with famous landmarks.

The Mouth of Truth had a huge line in front of it, so I decided not to stick my hand in it this time.

It wasn’t like anything happened once you’d stuck your hand in, so doing it once in my life had been enough.

Unlike me, this was Wakaba-chan’s first time in rome, so I spotted her in line with a camera in hand.

When we passed by the Trevi Fountain I threw in two coins just to be safe.

An estimated 3,000 euros are thrown into the fountain each day. The money has been used to subsidise a supermarket for Rome’s needy.

Ah! We were in a Christian country right now, but I’d forgotten to put my hands together when I prayed.

Yesterday Enjou said that Kaburagi’s Paris date was really more like a date between two girl friends, but the truth was I was envious of him.

It was too jealousy-inducing for the Chief of the Forever Alone village…

Moving on though, Rome sure was brown-coloured. At least that’s the image I got.

Maybe it was all the historical ruins.

If Paris was Kyoto, then I guess that made Rome Nara.

Anybody who was a fan of Imperial Roman history was sure to be drooling.

But wasn’t the culture of ancient Rome a bit too intense?

Like, the ancient Romans would eat up until they were full. But instead of stopping, they’d shove a peacock feather down their throats, throw it all up, all so that they could enjoy more of the food.

Who came up with that. It was such a gluttonous concept that it was kind of disturbing…

But the Vatican was nice.

The St. Peter’s Basilica and the Sistine Chapel were both solemn and amazing.

Designed principally by Donato Bramante, Michelangelo, Carlo Maderno and Gian Lorenzo Bernini, St. Peter’s is the most renowned work of Renaissance architecture and the largest church in the world.The Pietà is a work of Renaissance sculpture by Michelangelo Buonarroti, housed in St. Peter’s Basilica, Vatican City.

The Pieta was amazing, and the paintings on the ceiling were overwhelming.

The Sistine Chapel ceiling, painted by Michelangelo between 1508 and 1512, is a cornerstone work of High Renaissance art.

The only downside was that there were so many people it was hard to just take your time and look. It was one of those places you could spend a whole day in.

As a postage stamp collector I couldn’t resist the allure of the beautiful Vatican-exclusives. Since that was the case, I was going to use them to send air mail back to everyone in Japan.

Of course I’d be back in the country before the mail arrived, but if you visit the Vatican you just have to get some stamps, right~?

Who could resist sending mail from here?

The day before I’d gone to buy some lovely postcards from a store near our hotel.

They were of the paintings in the Vatican, and already had everyone’s addresses and my messages to them.

I had expressly prepared them so that all I needed to do now was put on a postage stamp and send them.

Ideally I’d have bought the postcards inside the Vatican City, but it would just be hard to find the time to write all my messages here~

Maybe I could just buy some of them as souvenirs.

Waah, there were so many pretty postage stamps.

I’m gunna bring a bunch of you back for memories.

My blood as a stamp collector was just boiling~

Gosh, they were just drawing me in!

This was the one I’d bought last time, wasn’t it. But this one, I don’t think I had…

Was it new?

Angel postcards were just perfect for Yukino-kun and the kids!

As for Oniisama and Ririna, I’d go with the holy mother and child.

And I loved how beautiful this one was.

I’d go with St. Peter’s Basilica for Otousama and Okaasama.

Sakura-chan, Aoi-chan, and my other friends though… I think I’d go with paintings for them after all.

Finally, I’d send a few to myself in secret, too.

‘Dear Reika,
How are you?’

“Kisshouin-saaaan. It’s time for our class to meet up,” called Satomi-kun.

“Okaaaay,” I called back.

Sorry, Satomi-kun. I’m supposed to be a class rep too.

“Say, Kisshouin-san, are you going to see any of the catacombs tomorrow?”

As if, idiot!

What do you mean ‘it’ll be super fun, we’ll get to see mountains of skeletons’?

Satomi-kun was definitely doing this on purpose, wasn’t he!?

Maybe instead of purifying my room I should use what was left of my salt on Satomi-kun…

“Hmm? Kisshouin-san, together some of the curls on the back of your head turn into the number of the beast, you know? Isn’t that pretty bad here in the Vatican?”

…I’ve decided.

I’ll throw the rest of my salt at Satomi-kun!

*

*

The next day was free time.

Naturally we weren’t going to anywhere dreadful like a catacomb, and instead we had enjoying delicious Italian food, and shopping planned.

“Pizza is just a must in Rome, isn’t it~?”

“There was a great place I ate at the last time I was in Rome.”

“Should we go there, then?”

While we were walking along and having fun, sometimes people whistled at us, or messed around and said “Hey! Japanese!” or “Pizza? Pizza?”.

It was uncomfortable.

We were basically on the doorstep of the headquarters for Christianity across the world, so why were these guys messing around when it wasn’t even noon yet?

Stop saying ‘siesta, siesta’ and get to work!

We went to a trattoria that was well-known for its pizza and ordered amatriciana and margherita, before heading to the Piazza di Spagna for some gelato.

Next was tiramisu!

Once our stomachs were sated it was time for shopping.

I decided to get Akimi-san some olive oil.

And I just wanted to buy all the cheese, from Pecorino Romano, to Parmigiano-Reggiano, the king of cheese!

I’d even heard stories about some of the banks around Italy storing Parmigiano-Reggiano in their vaults. I wonder how true they were.

As for sweets, since I’d already gotten a bunch in Paris I decided to lay off a little.

Not on the gianduja, though.

Gianduja or gianduia is a sweet chocolate spread containing about 30% hazelnut paste, invented in Turin during Napoléon’s regency.

Had to get that.

Wah! Stylish Italian stationery! I wanted sealing wax!

And the rose seal was just fashionable beyond belief!

I had to get one that said ‘R’!

Isn’t sealing letters with wax stamps just so ‘aristocrat’~!?

And the bottles of scented ink were just so cute.

I could get a glass pen and then give them together as a souvenir.

Maybe I ought to buy a quill too?

*

*

“We bought too much, didn’t we, Reika-sama?”

“Quite…”

My arms were being torn off.

*

*

On the last night of the trip we gathered in a room together and lounged around in masks, since the air in Europe had been a bit dry.

By now, we were all pretty beat.

“The schedule was a bit packed, but it was fun, wasn’t it.”

“It really was. But it would’ve been nice to stay in each country a bit more.”

“Let’s all go again together. We can make it our graduation trip.”

Graduation trip! I wanted in!

I shot to my feet.

“A splendid idea! A graduation trip! Shall we go?” I said.

“We should! Where do you want to go, Reika-sama?”

“Hmmm. Just Paris or London again would be fine too, but how about Spain or Northern Europe? If we go to Italy, then what if we visited Milan or Florence?”

“I want to go to Venice too.”

Venice, huh?

It was a minor dream of mine to ride on a gondola with my sweetheart.

I’d be holding up a fancy parasol by his side, as he smiled gently and whispered sweet nothings in my ear. My future lover.

How dreamy.

“Gondolas come to mind, and the boat trip down the Seine was great fun, wasn’t it?”

“It was! I’m glad we went.”

Me too. It was a bit cold, but it was a great time.

“Quite a few others took the boat tour as well.”

They did. But I’d been hearing stories about couples forming because of it, in quite a few classes.

Unforgiveable…

In the end, I didn’t have a single romantic encounter during the whole trip.

Not even a single boy had suggested spending a free day together as a group.

Even the Kaburagi-obsessed Tsuruhana-san’s group had enjoyed a Parisian sidewalk café with some boys.

I thought I had heard her laughing at me when we walked past that. I wonder if I was just hallucinating because of my inferiority complex…

So later, when I spotted Kemari Dainagon trying to talk to girls at the Piazza di Spagna, I made a beeline for him and stood right between them to get in his way. Kekeke.

But anyway, people did say that the couples that formed on trips like these broke up soon enough. It was just temporary, I bet.

They’d definitely be returning to my village soon enough.

Hohohoho.

“Are you okay, Reika-sama? You started glaring into the distance…”

Ah, oh my. I accidentally let my jealousy show.

Since my mask had set in, it was time to peel it off.

Let’s see, how was my skin doing?

I was just about to marvel at how glossy my skin looked when I was hit with a horrifying discovery.

“It’s gone…! My urna is gone!”

Impossible!

I looked over my hairline, again and again.

No way…!

It was really gone!

My symbol of good fortune, my urna!

Back when my eyebrows had gone partially bald I received this symbol of fortuna in return, so why was it gone now!?

“What’s the matter, Reika-sama!?”

“What’s gone?”

“My urna is gone! The urna I had growing on my forehead!” I desperately explained.

When had it disappeared!?

Had I taken it off along with the mask!?

But it was just a sheet mask! It shouldn’t have pulled anything off!

“What’s an urna…?”

“No idea…”

“It’s like a long white hair, apparently.”

“Ah, like those old man eyebrows?”

No!

You’re thinking of a Taoist immortal!

The urna is the curly one that Lord Shakyamuni has!

And strictly speaking the colourless hair I had wasn’t an urna but a blessed hair!

A curse comes home to roost…

Is this because I was too envious of the people in the Fulfilling Romance Village that my good fortune ran away!?

Was this an omen for worse luck in romance when I got back to Japan!?

“Now, now. Calm down, Reika-sama.”

“You must be tired, Reika-sama. Come on, it’s time to sleep.”

“But, my urna…! My blessed hair…!”

“Everything’s going to be juuust fine~”

Still wearing their masks, Serika-chan and the others pushed me into bed despite my protests, before surrounding it on all sides.

“It’s bedtime~ There’s a good girl~” they cooed, waving their hands back and forth.

Eh!? Was this some sort of black mass!?

“U-Umm…” I tried.

“Everything’s going to be juuust fine, Reika-sama~ It’s time for bed now.”

“Reika-sama is very tired. Sleep~ Sleep~”

“It’s okay, Reika-sama~ Sleep~”

And so there I was, laying in a dark room, surrounded by a group of singing Sukekiyo’s.

What did I do now?

Could it be that Serika-chan and the others were actually part of some demonic cult?